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<title>The Devil&#8217;s Dictionary: Q</title>
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<h1>Q</h1>

<p class="entry"><span class="def">queen</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A woman
by whom the realm is ruled when there is a king, and through whom it is ruled
when there is not.</p>

<p class="entry"><span class="def">quill</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> An
implement of torture yielded by a goose and commonly wielded by an ass. This
use of the quill is now obsolete, but its modern equivalent, the steel pen, is
wielded by the same everlasting Presence.</p>

<p class="entry"><span class="def">quiver</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A
portable sheath in which the ancient statesman and the aboriginal lawyer
carried their lighter arguments.</p>

<div class="poem">
<p class="poetry">He extracted from his quiver,</p>
<p class="poetry">Did the controversial Roman,</p>
<p class="poetry">An argument well fitted</p>
<p class="poetry">To the question as submitted,</p>
<p class="poetry">Then addressed it to the liver,</p>
<p class="poetry">Of the unpersuaded foeman.</p>
<p class="citeauth">Oglum P. Boomp</p>
</div>

<p class="entry"><span class="def">quixotic</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Absurdly
chivalric, like Don Quixote. An insight into the beauty and excellence of this
incomparable adjective is unhappily denied to him who has the misfortune to
know that the gentleman’s name is pronounced Ke-ho-tay.</p>

<div class="poem">
<p class="poetry">When ignorance from out of our lives can banish Philology, ‘tis folly to know Spanish.</p>
<p class="citeauth">Juan Smith</p>
</div>

<p class="entry"><span class="def">quorum</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A
sufficient number of members of a deliberative body to have their own way and
their own way of having it. In the United States Senate a quorum consists of
the chairman of the Committee on Finance and a messenger from the White House;
in the House of Representatives, of the Speaker and the devil.</p>

<p class="entry"><span class="def">quotation</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The
act of repeating erroneously the words of another. </p>

<div class="poem">
<p class="poetry">The words erroneously repeated.</p>
<p class="poetry">Intent on making his quotation truer,</p>
<p class="poetry">He sought the page infallible of Brewer,</p>
<p class="poetry">Then made a solemn vow that we would be</p>
<p class="poetry">Condemned eternally. Ah, me, ah, me!</p>
<p class="citeauth">Stumpo Gaker</p>
</div>

<p class="entry"><span class="def">quotient</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A
number showing how many times a sum of money belonging to one person is
contained in the pocket of another—usually about as many times as it can be got there.</p>

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